3/22/2007 @ 6:00AM

Colin Powell On The American Dream

Ret. Gen. Colin L. Powell was born in New York to immigrant parents and raised in the south Bronx. He served 35 years in the U.S. Army, eventually becoming a four-star general, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, national security adviser and U.S. secretary of state.

What is the American Dream?

The American Dream is something that every immigrant brought to this country, as my parents did, and that is the ability to go as far as you can in life, limited only by your own dreams and willingness to work hard.

And above all, the American Dream for these folks meant that your children will have the opportunity to do better than you will.

I lived the dream that my parents brought to this country, as did my sister. My parents came here as poor laborers. They left the country they loved–Jamaica–to go to a place where there was opportunity, a place where they could dream, a place they came to love deeply. They worked hard and watched their children become successful, one as an educator and one as a soldier.